Marco Polo - Laurence Bergreen [209]
The chapter on Quinsai is the longest in Marco’s account, and this signifies its importance. Nevertheless, intriguing uncertainties remain. In his book Quinsai; with Other Notes on Marco Polo, A. C. Moule notes that the term “City of Heaven,” employed by Marco, does not appear in Chinese annals. Where Marco came by this term, or whether the residents of Quinsai used it, is open to question. Moule (page 11) attributes the precision with which Marco described Quinsai to “an official account which was sent to the Mongol general Baian [Bayan] when he approached the city.” As a result, “the number and accuracy of the topographical and other details mentioned or implied exceeds those in the description of any other place in the book.” Chief among the unanswered questions is Marco’s exact role in Quinsai. For more on this issue, see the rigorous Olschki, Marco Polo’s Asia, pages 174–175. It is possible that the notion that Marco was appointed governor of Quinsai by no less than Kublai Khan originated with Giambattista Ramusio long after the fact.
The controversy surrounding the number of bridges in Quinsai is taken up by Moule in Quinsai, pages 23–29. By coincidence, Marco also says there are twelve thousand houses in Quinsai, when there were, in fact, many times that number. “Twelve thousand” was a conventional term indicating countless houses. Despite Moule’s statement to the contrary, it seems likely that Marco was simply employing the same figure of speech concerning the number of bridges.
Wu Tzu-mu, about whom little is known, left a poignant description of Quinsai at the peak of its prosperity, in a work known as the “Account of the Gruel Dream” (1274) wherein a peasant dreams of luxury while a modest innkeeper prepares a simple meal—in other words, the poor man dreams of the abundance that Quinsai symbolizes. “In no matter what district, in the streets, on the bridges, at the gates, and in every odd corner, there are everywhere to be found barrows, shops, and emporiums where business is done,” he writes. “The reason for this is that people are in daily need of the necessities of life, such as firewood, rice, oil, salt, soya sauce, vinegar, and tea, and to a certain extent even of luxury articles, while rice and soup are absolute essentials, for even the poorest cannot do without them. To tell the truth, the inhabitants of Quinsai are spoiled and difficult to please.”
He evoked the city’s splendid teahouses catering to this demanding clientele: “They make arrangements of the flowers of the four seasons, hang paintings by celebrated artists, decorate the walls of the establishment, and all the year round sell unusual teas and curious soups. During the winter months, they sell in addition a very fine powdered tea, pancakes, onion tea, and sometimes soup of salted beans. During the hot season they add as extras plum-flower wine with a mousse of snow, a beverage for contracting the gall bladder, and herbs against the heat.” And, like Marco, he reveled in the city’s brothels: “Let us visit one of the chic establishments, with such promising signs as ‘The Happy Meeting,’ or ‘The Seduction,’ or ‘The Pleasures of Novelty.’…A dozen prostitutes, luxuriously dressed and heavily made up, gather at the entrance to the main arcade to await the command of the customers, and have an airy gracefulness.”
For reminiscences of the City of Heaven by Odoric of Pordenone and Ibn Battuta, see Pauthier’s edition of Marco Polo’s Travels, Le Livre de Marco Polo, page 502, note. Jacques Gernet’s splendid Daily Life in China on the Eve of the Mongol Invasion, 1250–1276 discusses precautions against fire on pages 36–37 and 52.
Sexual mores in China receive extended treatment in R. H. van Gulick’s Sexual Life in Ancient China (see especially pages 138–260). For another scholarly discussion of Chinese sexual attitudes and practices, see Needham’s Science and Civilisation in China, volume 2, pages 146–150. Needham emphasizes the philosophical underpinnings of Chinese sexual customs, especially Taoism, and stresses the customs’ social and psychological